A Kind of Loving

"We can't wait on the weather." Clenching her small hands, moistening her lips, she presses his arm as he parks the Land Rover under the trees. "We can't wait on the weather." An impatient tremble in the voice, rain patterning the windscreen. He nods and jerks the driving seat back, reaches behind him for the boots and wrestles his legs, one at a time, into the tunnels. She grabs for the other pair of waders, extending her bare legs and pulling up with both hands to press her feet against the soles before sliding out of her skirt.

Standing beside the open door, pushing his two hundred pounds into the yellow rain jacket, working the buttons, he motions to the lake visible through the trees. "On the island we'll not be seen even by the fishermen and be out of the wind and the wet there."

The passenger door is open, she steps down from the seat. "Hope it's not far, I'm all psyched up right now." A few cautious steps stirring the wet grass, fastening her own yellow rain-jacket, pushing dark dyed hair into a rainhat and tying the strings under her chin, watching as he fixes his own, bending the brim to channel the rain away from his face.

The marsh is grey and green in the rain and their feet raise dark water into silver splashes. He helps her down the bank and they merge into a mist filled with the shadows of startled, shrieking birds, divers, ducks and moorhens, the deep water moving in slow circles from their boots. "Don't be disappointed if there isn't a result first time, there are so many factors."

"But the best thing is we are going to try."

The water shallows and they climb onto the island pushing aside the reeds to reveal a wood cabin perched on poles sunk into the marsh, built for the watchers of the waterfowl in the river estuary park.

Shaking off the rain she waits as he removes the padlock. "At least you understand. I want it done without all the love stuff." Staring round the cabin, eyes adjusting to the semi-darkness, she bends, feeling under the wet rain-jacket, wriggles her pants down, stretching them to pull over the waders. She kicks them into the corner, unbuttons the jacket and pushes up the wool jumper. "Best you see first what I've got."

Removing her bra reveals a pair of breasts, even larger than he had pictured, with dark red nipples, standing out above a thick waist and wide hips, his eyes moving down to short legs, thighs a tight fit for the tops of the boots.

Rubbing her hands slowly down his coat she presses against him, then feels between the tops of his boots. "Must be a nice feeling for a man, getting hard, filling his penis? Want me to help you make it big, then you can get it in and do it quick?"

"That won't be necessary." He unbelts and unbuttons his coat and pulls a straw mattress and a cushion from the bunk bed to the centre of the floor.

" Ukk! I've got to lie on that? It's damp and it smells."

"Position is most important otherwise we might have used the back seat." He works his zipper, removes his wrist watch, then his glasses to a pocket in the coat as she places herself on the mattress. Coats and boots rustle and creak as he follows her, staring at her, aware that he is now violently erect. "Oh, and try to keep your legs up afterwards."

Taking a sitting position she places her small arms round her knees, a strained, nervous tone in the voice. "Right, no more talk, let's just do it."

He presses her back. Raincoats rustle, boots rasp against boots, she gasps as he presses and pushes slowly up. A flood of pleasure seizes him as he begins the penetrative movements.

Small sounds, expelled breathes and grunts. He adjusts his position, lifts her higher on the cushion placed under her and becomes more vigorous, adopting a regular rhythm. In a voice that has a tone of surprise, "Can feel you right in me."

Holding himself up on extended arms, he looks down at the thick sculptured neck and chin beaded with saliva. "How is it?"

She wriggles under him. "Just do it properly."

He bends forward sliding in with slow motions. "That nice?"

She stares up at the corrugated ceiling rattling with the rain. "What this fuck is going to do to me, that's what's nice."

"But are you enjoying it?"

She bends her head, staring for a moment at the partly withdrawn erection, then up at him. "I'll enjoy feeling the sperm going into me."

He presses her legs wider apart, one hand fondling a breast, resuming the action. In a detached state of pleasure, he adopts a rhythm of short and then long thrusts and her pelvis twists upwards. A rush of wings as a flight of calling Canada geese passes over them: startled he feels his release, sudden sharp spurts.

She pushes out her tongue and rubs it round her lips, eyes wide open, staring, as if in a trance. He pulls slowly out, gasping, lifting himself from the mattress, grasping the heels of her boots and holding them up from the floor. "There, now it's all down to you and your chemistry."

"Forty minutes you said before your sperm arrives on target. When will I know?"

"We will try a tester later next week."

"I'm made for babies don't you think?"

"Your pelvic structure is as nature intended but you could do with loosing a bit more weight."

A hand is waved in an irritated, dismissive gesture. "I dieted and lost twelve pounds getting ready for this fuck."

"Impregnation is the scientific word."

"Kate doesn't believe in scientific words. 'Get yourself fucked then at the right time' is what she said when I said I wanted a baby so badly it was hurting."

"I suppose if it wasn't me then you'd find someone else."

"No, Kate said it had to be an older intelligent man, one with good genes." She looks up as a large bird makes a noisy forced landing on the roof. "You took much more persuading than I imagined." Dust from the roof floats down and she pulls the front of her jacket over her exposed breasts. "Then I was scared you would back out of it seeing the awful weather. You had the perfect excuse when I called at the lab and told you I had done the test and the signs said I was hot and shouldn't wait."

He smiled. "A crisis you told my assistant."

"A crisis right between the curse going and coming."

"Mensuration. Try to use the proper words."

"Whatever you call it, I'll be glad to have done with it for nine months. Being a woman is a tough act, believe it." She wets her lips with her tongue and the lipstick glows. "You did your part well."

He slowly lowers her legs back to the floor and helps her to stand. The bra is restored, her wool jumper pulled down, she picks up and puts the pants into a pocket then wraps the coat around her, fastening the buttons and pushing it down so the base covers the tops of the boots. "Getting a baby in me is easier than it's going to be getting it out."

"That's one fact you have got right."

"Kate says that seeing me bringing up my breakfast is going to be gross."

"Tell her it stops after fourteen weeks."

"I'm so glad it's you as you know these things."

A laugh. "I think I'd be wise to change my mobile number. I can see myself being an advisor rather than a father getting calls in the middle of the night."

"Can I say thank you?"

"My pleasure."

In a silence broken by the strident conversation of waterfowl, the splash of the water against their boots, the rustle of the rain on their coats, they wade back to the parking enclosure. She is detached, focused on the possible outcome. It is he who is in an uncontrolled emotional state of euphoria; a curious guilt for not feeling guilty, more relaxed than he could ever recall. He is, he reminds himself, a thirty eight years old male - a doctorate in ornithology -- a scientific researcher on marsh birds - and she is somewhere close to half his age and, he decides, a possible candidate for child bearing obesity if she is not careful. But the thought of him being a father is overwhelming. He has read of these things in the tabloids B showbiz people and gays and lesbians - but this is happening to him. Science has always been more essential to him than marriage and family and he has contented himself with brief affairs. As the wet raincoats and the boots are thrown into the back of the vehicle, it is a realization that suddenly seems bewildering.

"If there is no result, then we will try again next month." He gropes for his shoes. "But you rushed me today and next time, with a bit more notice, I will look for a lot more comfort -- a hotel room maybe."

She presses his arm. "That would be nice, Harold." It is a shock hearing his name. "You're so gentle and so experienced." Smile. "It was easier than I thought. I'm tingling all over. And I'm sure you enjoyed it so I must let you do it again anyway as a proper thank you." A serious expression. "We can do it even when I'm fixed to wear the big bump." She circles a hand under her breasts then leans across and gives him a careful kiss on the mouth. It is unexpected, their first meeting of lips. "If I was ever likely to be in love with a man then it would have to be you."

He turns, pulls her towards him and returns the kiss, taking longer, looking for an excuse to use her name. "And if you hadn't got Kate then I'd have to consider doing what our parents would have said was the correct thing, asking Myra, an expectant mother, to marry me. Then maybe we could both learn all about parenting, love and loving following all the rules of a polite society."

She laughs with him, a soft vibrant laugh. "Stuff marriage, parenting and society, Kate and I are all fixed for the baby loving part, you can be sure and certain of that." Another laugh. "I suppose being a scientific parent, if we married, you'd insist on our four children calling you 'father'" Another kiss. "And you'd be right, 'daddy' is such a naff word."

"Four babies?"

"Oh yes, you're so good at it I believe I'd soon get to enjoy impregnation. And insist on it. "

"So you're not really a..."

She puts a finger to his lips. "Don't like labels. I'm not really anything but just me -- a help-you person in a visitors'centre in a wildlife park, a female with raging hormones. But right now and for the future Kate is the only person I'd want to be with, who understands me, who I feel close to and intimate. The baby will be our bond, our purpose."

The wind shook more rain from the trees rattling the roof as they dried themselves with the car rug, watching a pair of curious ducks waddling up to see if there were any left-overs from a picnic. "Men live on another planet -- except you, and even you would soon be off on your spaceship taking your sperm with you."

The engine surges to life and first gear is engaged. "This has been quite an afternoon even for a spaceman. You have awakened something and, Miss Myra, I am pleased you seduced me -- if seduction is right word - as I have made some unscientific discoveries. One is that you can be married to science but she is not a good parent."

She holds his arm. "You'll find someone. Someone really nice who you will love and will love you, and who will love being impregnated." She strokes gently. "You'll be a great father."

Braking at the gate to the park he turns to her. "It's been all against the social rules and historical custom but I suppose you could describe this as a kind of loving." He turns the vehicle into the road. " A loving for a new life."